


My People

by Fallwater023



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Guys did I write a funny?, Humor, I apologize for Jim's potty mouth, Klingons (sorta), M/M, Swearing, Vulcans, also abuse of parentheses, citizenship disputes, lots of swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-28
Updated: 2014-08-28
Packaged: 2018-02-15 04:12:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2215353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fallwater023/pseuds/Fallwater023
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first few times, getting a new citizenship in the line of duty was cool. Now it's just getting ridiculous.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My People

**Author's Note:**

> Yes. Really. This tired old trope. And a quasi-AU to boot. I apologize, guys. But yay, over 100 hits on my first story, so I'll post this little thing and get it off my chest. Really, the Spock/Kirk ship is mostly teased, but if you tilt your head and squint it's there.

When Jim was in grade school, he recited the Federation pledge every Monday before class, like every other kid on the planet. Sometimes, he thinks back on the fourth line, I am a citizen of the universe, and wants to cackle hysterically. Or maybe cry a little. 

See, it started with his parents. Earth-born human Federation citizens, both in Starfleet, both on deployment to Klingon space when he was born. The Prime Document declares all children are born citizens of their parents’ planet of origin first, then citizens of the Federation if one or both parents are Fed citizens, then citizens of their birthplace. Absent criminal conviction, these three citizenships, once granted, cannot be stripped. So there’s bouncing baby Jimmy, citizen of Earth, the Federation, and Klingon. Yes, Klingon. It’s on his fucking birth certificate, because that fucking Kelvin nurse had a sense of humor. 

That was just the tip of the iceberg. He stripped his Tarsus IV planetary citizenship from all the records he could get his digital hands on as soon as he got to a PADD, but the Tarsus system citizenship stuck because it was coded deeper than he could extract. Back to Iowa for him. And then he had to lose his shit and drive Frank’s car off a cliff, didn’t he? A-hole sent him packing to five different reform schools, the last two being offworld on Orion (where he learned to talk dirty) and Vulcan (where he learned to talk nerdy). He hadn’t meant to walk away with an Orion citizenship and a Vulcan deportation/cease-and-desist order (the first such order from Vulcan in Federation history to involve a minor) before his sixteenth birthday, but the deportation got sealed with his juvie records and he wound up on a planet where he didn’t have to wear a dress for the rest of his adult life, so he counted that one as a win. 

Back to Iowa, where Pike talked him into Starfleet, and the five-year-mission, and then it was a free-for-all. Betazed, Deneb, Hekaras, Kessik. About fifteen zillion immediate post-warp planetary interventions ended with him having to accept honorary citizenship on behalf of his family, clan, crew, planet, species, gender (That was a fun mission), galaxy, or the Federation. He got a fucking Muddi citizenship. From the planet Mudd. He didn’t even know ‘Muddi’ was the name for a native of Mudd, possibly because, oh, most Muddi were more fondly known as fucking murderous androids. He still wasn’t sure how that had happened, he just woke up on the transporter pad with a hastily-signed legal document in his back pocket and a string of binary code that Spock assured him was a Muddi telephone number printed on the back of his hand. Jim had blearily assured Spock that he’d fulfilled his duties as “The bestest bestie a man could ask for!” and then crawled off to his quarters to sleep off his worst hangover in years. 

(Spock still hasn’t told him that the last five symbols denote a crude symbolic heart. Jim will never know this, nor will he ever know why.)

Anyway, all this didn’t matter until recently, when New Vulcan decided to get in on the act by declaring Jim, currently something of a folk hero, an honorary Vulcan citizen. There was a ceremony. Chanting. Gongs. Dresses for all. And then the announcement. 

“We welcome you, James Tiberius Kirk of Earth, the Federation, Klingon - ,” The stern, ancient-looking Vulcan with an intimidatingly bulky scroll paused at that, as did everyone in the room (oh god, paparazzi, Jim was going to die, the press would crucify him), then marshaled his logic and continued “Tarsus, Orion, Betazed…” He kept on, apparently going in chronological order, and Jim groaned internally as he recognized some of the names of those fifteen zillion post-warp-intervention planets. They would be here all afternoon at this rate. 

Old Vulcan Dude persevered, though there were some awkward moments (“Mudd” - insert significant pause and raised eyebrow), and about twenty minutes later finished, raspily “ - and New Vulcan.” 

The bells started up again, a little hesitantly, and Jim processed gratefully after T’Pau, Old Vulcan Dude, and the other members of the Vulcan High Council. 

“Thank god that’s over,” he muttered to Spock, who as his closest Vulcan companion (and that had been another awkward conversation with T’Pau, who had favored them both with an eyebrow that Spock later told him had not been raised in over half a century) was walking beside him. 

“Jim,” Spock murmured back, “I believe it is my solemn duty as your ‘bestie’ to alert you of the necessity for a new ‘hobby’.” 

At his captain’s blank stare, he explained further, gently, the little bastard. “Your collection of citizenships, sir, has become so comprehensive as to present significant political difficulty to yourself and your crew…” 

Jim managed to refrain from striking his first officer in public, mostly because he was already half-collapsed from heat exhaustion. They all made it back to the Enterprise safely (oh, sweet, sweet oxygen) and departed for liberty on Terra (oh, sweet, sweet M3 gravity) with no delays or complications (oh, sweet, sweet plot evasion). And they all lived happily ever after, except for the Starfleet Records Department, who on Jim’s retirement refused to sort out the impossible tangle of his citizenship documentation and stripped everything but his Klingon citizenship. Jim, who hadn’t really wanted a Federation-style retirement anyway, was fine with this. 

“Jim!” Spock screamed at him from the other side of the battlefield (sorry, classroom). It was a very manly scream. His voice had gotten deeper in the decades of their service together, though the unfair bastard still hadn’t shown any gray hairs. But he had followed Jim to the Klingon Planetary Service Academy for their retirement, so Jim could forgive him out of the kindness of his heart. Jim finished lecturing his defeated opponents (sorry, students) and looked up. 

“Yeah!?” 

“We are NO LONGER BESTIES!”


End file.
